The Language Attitudes and Reported Practices of Parents of Preschool Children in Cyprus

Abstract

This paper examines the language attitudes and reported language practices of parents of children at the kindergarten level in the Greek-Cypriot community of Cyprus. The two varieties spoken in this community are in a diglossic relationship: the high variety, Standard Modern Greek (henceforth SMG), which is also the official language of Cyprus, and the low variety, the Greek-Cypriot dialect (henceforth GC), which is the non-standardised native variety. Examining the parental attitudes and reported practices of diglossic speakers in the home is crucial for the vitality of both varieties as well as for the speakers’ confidence and sense of identity. Data were collected using questionnaires and interviews. The results from the questionnaires, which are discussed in this paper, show that although most parents consider both SMG and GC to be part of their national and cultural heritage and linguistic identity and express positive attitudes towards both varieties, they encourage their children to use the standard variety from a preschool age. This could be due to the fact that the official language of education in Cyprus is SMG, parents, as diglossic speakers, wish for their children to express themselves fluently in writing in the high variety (SMG), and generally to succeed at school. These language attitudes and reported practices reveal how strong the ideology of the standard language (Milroy, 2007) is in diglossic settings such as Cyprus.